In article , tim..... says...
What a strange route to include Amsterdam in a trip to
Germany/Denmark/Sweden

Because I had to be in Amsterdam on these dates, to attend a conference.

Of course people arrive early for a twice a day ferry.. Many of them will
have come from 100s of kms away and will have left a lot of slack in their
drive so that they don't miss it. Even so, if you come from a short
distance away and can time your arrival for the last minute, many occasional
ferries have a minimum check in of 1 hour - arriving only 20 minutes before
it leaves is just asking to be left on the quay-side (though I can't find
Stena's rules about this)

Would have been interesting to know how long you queued for the Fehmarnbelt
ferry.

You misunderstood that. We chose a late ferry (8:15pm), to have the
whole day available for sightseeing. Then we were done with Lübeck
earlier than expected and the weather was not that good, so we drove to
Puttgarden early, arriving at 6pm. We drove a bit around the area, but
didn't find anything terribly interesting and it was raining anyway. So
we didn't do anything special until we got on the ferry.
At 7:20pm we drove to the ferry terminal, expecting to wait a while for
the 8:15pm ferry, but were lucky to be put on the 7:45pm ferry, thereby
shortening the waiting time by half an hour.
--
Alfred Molon
http://www.molon.de - Photos of Asia, Africa and Europe